State AG Opinions
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Is it enough for a North Dakota board to cite the executive-session statute on the agenda, or does the chair have to say the legal basis out loud?
Both. The agenda needs the general topic, and the chair must announce the specific legal authority (such as 'attorney consultation') in open meeting before going into executive session. Citing the…
Can a third-party app or service in California legally buy state lottery tickets for me and charge me a fee for the convenience?
No. A person, company, or app that buys California State Lottery tickets for another person and charges a fee for the service violates Penal Code section 337a, which prohibits receiving, holding, or…
Can an Arkansas county close a criminal justice coordinating committee meeting to the public by calling it 'advisory'?
No. Under Ark. Code Ann. § 14-14-109, every county-created body, committee, or subordinate entity must meet publicly, regardless of whether it is labeled 'advisory' or 'governing.' The Washington…
Can a South Dakota city with a home rule charter, like Sioux Falls, switch its municipal elections to ranked choice voting or approval voting instead of a traditional one-vote-per-person plurality system?
Approval voting yes, ranked choice voting no. Chief Deputy McGuigan concluded that approval voting, where voters can mark approval of multiple candidates, fits within SDCL 9-13-25's framework (a…
Can a Mississippi county pay to elevate private homes that don't meet flood-zone elevation requirements?
No. A Mississippi county cannot use public funds to perform or pay for elevation work on privately owned homes, even to maintain National Flood Insurance Program eligibility. That would be an…
How can a Mississippi community college dispose of confiscated firearms when ownership records are lost?
ICC cannot treat its confiscated firearms as lost or abandoned on its own, and forfeiture under Section 97-37-3 requires a qualifying conviction. The AG suggests legal action to determine ownership…
Can a public university release names, ranks, and salaries of faculty whose positions are being recommended for elimination under Arkansas FOIA?
Yes. The Arkansas State University System's plan to release names, ranks, employment status, departments, and current salaries of faculty whose positions are being recommended for elimination is…
Can Delaware's agriculture agency withhold bird flu depopulation records under veterinary privilege or the investigatory-files exemption?
The AG found that the Department of Agriculture failed to justify withholding records on depopulation methods and their approval. DDA did not address the full scope of veterinary privilege, explain…
Did a South Carolina hobbyist need a recycler permit to buy small amounts of nonferrous metal?
No, if the purchase was genuinely for a hobby. The Attorney General said the recycler permit applied to a person in the business of paying for used nonferrous metals, not a hobbyist buying small…
Could Hampton County’s lone House delegation member appoint an airport commissioner?
Yes. The Attorney General predicted that the sole Hampton County House delegation member could appoint the House delegation’s additional member to the county airport commission under the statute.…
Do West Virginia municipal court technology and administrative fees, adopted by Home Rule cities, run afoul of the statutory rule that home-rule ordinances may not be 'contrary to' state criminal law?
The example technology, court maintenance, and administrative fees described to the AG do not appear to be 'contrary to' state criminal law under W. Va. Code § 8-1-5a(i)(11). The opinion says they…
How long can a Mississippi school board contract last when board members serve staggered five-year terms?
Three years. Without specific statutory authority, contracts cannot extend beyond the term of a majority of current board members. With five members on staggered five-year terms, a majority of three…
Can a Mississippi city use a quitclaim deed to release old use restrictions and a right of first refusal on property it sold years ago?
Yes. Section 89-1-25 lets the city execute a quitclaim deed releasing the use restriction and option of first refusal without consideration and without re-bidding, after entering an order on the…
Does serving on a California county board of education and a city council inside that county at the same time count as holding two incompatible offices?
Substantial legal questions exist about whether sitting on the Orange County Board of Education and the Tustin City Council at the same time violates the incompatible-offices rule in Government Code…
Does a Delaware Budget Committee violate FOIA when a quorum meets without public notice to discuss employee bonuses?
Yes. The City of Harrington's Budget Committee violated FOIA's open meeting requirements when a quorum (two of three members) met privately on February 22, 2022 with the City Manager, Chief of…
Must industrial-park fee revenue go to schools in the same share as ordinary property tax?
No. The Attorney General said fee-in-lieu revenue from a joint-county industrial park did not have to mirror normal property-tax shares. The park agreement had to specify allocations to all local…
If a candidate loses a primary for one division of a Tennessee circuit court, can they still appear on the general election ballot for a different division of the same circuit court?
It depends on which party label they want. They cannot appear on the general election ballot as an independent or as a different party's nominee for the other division (Tennessee's sore-loser law,…
Can a journalist get use-of-force data, prison reports, and video-retention policies from the Delaware Department of Correction under FOIA?
DOC properly withheld the use-of-force data and reports because they pertain to pending federal litigation against DOC employees (Davis v. Neal). DOC failed on its statutory and investigatory-file…
Can South Carolina police book someone at the station and release them on their own recognizance without a magistrate?
The AG referred the police chief to SLED for specific booking questions. A judicial officer generally had to set a personal recognizance bond before release unless a specific statute provided an exception.
Who enforces South Carolina insurance claims-practice rules, and do they cover a school board insurance trust?
The Attorney General said the South Carolina Department of Insurance enforced the cited insurance penalty and claims-practice provisions. The office declined to decide whether the School Board…
Which South Carolina Senate districts governed a vacancy election before the 2024 general election?
The Attorney General said the existing Senate districts governed sitting senators and any special election to fill a Senate vacancy before the 2024 general election. The newly drawn districts began…
Did Arkansas's Act 714 of 2021 take away an Arkansas city council's authority to set policies for its police department?
No. Act 714 of 2021 did not generally remove a first-class city council's authority to set internal police-department policies. The AG said the council's authority remains under other statutes and…
Can the Arkansas legislature force counties to give sheriff's deputies the same vacation as municipal police?
No. Amendment 55 to the Arkansas Constitution gives each county's quorum court authority to fix the compensation of county employees. The legislature cannot amend Ark. Code Ann. § 14-14-805 to…
Can a Delaware state office shield audit working papers from a FOIA request just by calling them confidential?
No. The AG ruled the Delaware Office of the Auditor of Accounts violated FOIA by redacting audit working papers without citing any Delaware statute or case law that recognizes a working-papers…
Could a South Carolina judge continue hearing cases after the mandatory retirement age of 72?
The Attorney General said judges in the unified judicial system had to retire at 72 under the cited retirement statute. The Chief Justice could later assign a qualified retired judge to specified…
Can a Tennessee community oversight board take political stances on legislation or audit a police department's finances?
No to both. Under Tenn. Code Ann. § 38-8-312, a community oversight board's authority is limited to reviewing matters reported to it and issuing advisory reports and recommendations. Taking formal…
Could one person serve on the Irmo-Chapin Recreation Commission and lead Lexington-Richland School District Five?
Yes, the Attorney General said. A recreation commissioner was likely a public officer, but the school superintendent was an employee under contract, rather than a second public officer, on the facts…
Could Beaufort County fund animal control across a county line and give its code officers a second county commission?
The Attorney General predicted that a county could spend funds under a joint-services agreement with a town extending into another county. A second code-enforcement commission in the neighboring…
When did laws passed in Kentucky's 2022 regular legislative session take effect?
July 14, 2022. The Attorney General concluded that, under Section 55 of the Kentucky Constitution, legislation passed during the 2022 Regular Session, other than general appropriation bills and acts…
Can a Delaware town split a public comment period across two meetings and still meet open-meeting rules?
The AG found that the record did not support the alleged FOIA violation. Fenwick Island split comment on a low-speed vehicle ordinance between a hearing and a Council meeting, and the approved…
Can a Delaware lawyer get police accident reports for officer-involved crashes through FOIA, or are uniform traffic collision reports exempt?
Wilmington did not violate FOIA. Uniform traffic collision reports are statutorily exempt under 21 Del. C. § 313(b) (incorporated into FOIA through § 10002(o)(6)), and they also fall within the…
Could a South Carolina candidate send a signed party-pledge filing by mail, email, or fax?
The Attorney General did not declare remote filing automatically valid. It said the statutes did not directly settle the delivery method and predicted a court might defer to the State Election…
When a Delaware agency claims it produced everything responsive to a FOIA request, what proof must it provide?
Yes. The Office of the Auditor of Accounts (AOA) violated FOIA by failing to include a sworn affidavit describing its search efforts. AOA produced two statements of work in response to a…
Can a Delaware village resident FOIA the home addresses and phone numbers of all eligible voters in the village?
The AG declined to decide whether the Village had to release these records. Home addresses and phone numbers carry substantial privacy weight, but a prior opinion released voter addresses under a…
Can a West Virginia legislative rule continue to require county executive committee chairperson consent to early voting locations after the Legislature amended the underlying statute in 2011 to drop that requirement?
No, not for the consent piece. W. Va. Code of State Rules § 153-13-3.5, which gives the chairs of the county executive committees veto power over early voting locations, conflicts with the post-2011…
How much can a Mississippi city regulate medical cannabis dispensaries through zoning if it doesn't opt out?
A Mississippi city that hasn't opted out can use zoning to control where dispensaries, research facilities, and testing facilities can locate, can create a special 'medical commercial zone,' and can…
Did a large Texas county have to share its direct CARES Act COVID relief money with smaller cities inside it?
No, the federal law didn't require it. Senator Brandon Creighton asked about Montgomery County's handling of Coronavirus Relief Fund (CRF) money under the CARES Act. The CRF sent direct payments…
Can a Texas judge who is 74 on election day but turns 75 before the term starts run for another term?
No. The Jackson County Criminal District Attorney asked whether a district judge who is 74 on election day, but who turns 75 between election day and the start of the new term, may serve the…
Could a Texas school district give extra COVID paid leave only to vaccinated employees?
A court would likely find Houston ISD's extra COVID leave policy violated Executive Order GA-39 because employees had to show proof of vaccination or medical exemption to obtain the benefit, the AG…
Can a Delaware village hold a fully virtual public meeting during the COVID emergency, and is an agenda that just lists 'officer reports' and 'old business' enough to satisfy FOIA?
Two of the three FOIA claims succeeded. The Village was allowed to hold a fully virtual meeting in March 2022 because Delaware was still under a public-health state of emergency. But it failed to…
Are cotton gins, grain elevators, slaughterhouses, processing plants, and milk bottling plants automatically exempt from Tennessee county zoning rules because they handle agricultural products?
No. Tenn. Code Ann. § 13-7-114 gives no blanket exemption to these operations. The building must stand on land devoted to agricultural use and be incidental to the agricultural enterprise there. A…
Are conspiracy, attempt, or accomplice-liability convictions for serious crimes excluded from Virginia's enhanced earned sentence credits, the same as the underlying offenses?
Convictions for conspiracy, attempt, solicitation, accessory before the fact, and principal in the second degree to crimes listed in § 53.1-202.3(A) are excluded from Virginia's enhanced earned…
Which public impound towing fees set the cap for private-lot trespass towing in Maryland?
The Attorney General said the amount doubled for Maryland's private-lot trespass towing cap covers fees tied to the tow itself, such as hook-up, mileage, or time. Storage and notice fees and traffic…
Did a Clarendon County school trustee’s election as mayor vacate the trustee seat?
Yes, the Attorney General concluded. Both positions were public offices for South Carolina’s dual-office rule, so assuming the mayoral office vacated the previously held school trustee seat by…
Which Arkansas statute controls how an Arkansas county uses sales-tax proceeds to fund a public economic-development corporation?
It depends on which statute the county used to levy the tax. If Clark County levied its sales tax under Ark. Code Ann. § 14-174-101 et seq. (the older county-economic-development authority), then…
Can a California school board member resign their seat and then be reappointed by the same board to fill the vacancy they just created?
Substantial questions of law exist about whether Tim Shaw's reappointment to the Orange County Board of Education seat he had just resigned violates Government Code section 1752(a)'s ban on…
Can a Delaware agency satisfy a FOIA request by sending a link to the source webpage instead of attaching the records?
Yes. The AG ruled the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services did not violate FOIA when it answered a request for records supporting a COVID-19 booster effectiveness claim by providing…
What happens in North Dakota if a city forgets to post notice of a city council meeting?
The AG found a violation of N.D.C.C. § 44-04-20. Because the city had already prepared and published detailed minutes, it also had to provide copies free to the requester and anyone else who asked.…
When DMV's database can't easily search 2.5 million records, can DelDOT charge me for a DTI programmer to write a custom search?
Yes. DelDOT's DMV runs on a 20-year-old DOS-based system. Without a custom DTI program, manually finding salvage-certificate records would have cost $9 million and taken one employee 200 years.…
Can a Delaware agency withhold all PFAS test results and internal emails about a statutorily required drinking-water survey by labeling everything a 'working draft'?
No. Delaware's working-draft exemption protects actual draft documents and emails proposing specific revisions to those drafts, but it does not cover raw test data or internal communications that…
Are members of California's Fair Political Practices Commission banned from donating to presidential and congressional campaigns?
Yes. The Government Code section 83105 contribution ban applies to all elections held in California, which includes federal elections for President, U.S. Senate, and U.S. House of Representatives.
How much control must Greenville Health Authority keep when a private corporation runs hospital operations?
The Attorney General said the Authority could use a private corporation for management and administrative work but could not surrender its core statutory duties or final decision-making power. The…
Could Lancaster County add leftover capital-projects sales-tax money to a later tax’s first project?
Yes, the Attorney General said. Once projects funded by the earlier tax were completed, excess collections could fund voter-approved projects in the reimposed tax’s listed priority order, in…
Can a Texas conviction for unlawfully carrying a weapon before September 2021 be expunged along with the arrest records?
Probably, in the right case. The Nueces County District Attorney asked whether Code of Criminal Procedure article 55.01(a)(1)(C), which lets a person expunge all records and files relating to the…
Does the American Red Cross have to file disaster-relief financial reports with Tennessee, or is its federal status enough to exempt it?
No, the Red Cross does not have to file the quarterly disaster-relief reports required by Tenn. Code Ann. § 48-101-521. Because the Red Cross is a federal instrumentality already required to file…
Can a Delaware family obtain DHSS investigation records about a long-term care facility incident under FOIA?
No. The AG found DHSS's investigative records about a long-term care facility incident exempt under the investigatory-files provision, § 10002(o)(3), and the statutory exemption incorporating 16…
Could South Carolina charge the vehicle infrastructure fee when a licensed dealer bought cars for daily rentals?
The Attorney General said no. It treated a licensed dealer’s purchase of vehicles for subsequent daily rental as a purchase for resale under the fee exclusion, and expressly amended a 2021 opinion…
What happened to South Carolina state aid if a county cut the salary or office budget of an official receiving a state supplement?
The Attorney General said the State Treasurer had to make a corresponding reduction in aid to the county. The statute gave the affected officer no personal compensation remedy, and the Treasurer…
Did a qualifying student with exceptional needs need an education grant to play sports at the zoned public school?
No, under the 2021–22 budget proviso the Attorney General analyzed. A student meeting the proviso’s two cited definitions could participate in sports at the zoned public school without actually…
If the North Dakota Board of University and School Lands has lands that didn't lease at the first auction, can it hold a second auction, and does the second auction have to be at the county seat?
Yes and yes. Section 15-04-14 lets the Board lease unleased trust lands either by direct contract or by a second public auction, the choice being a discretionary call under its fiduciary duty. If it…
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